Hey, that topic is just what I was looking for! And I was asking stupid questions at “Lucidity Intro”… But I hoped there is a common classification… While in Dm7’s scale I am at the average level, I have also had, according to mystic’s classification, tacit, post-lucid, semi-lucid, proto-lucid dreams… I don’t mention non-lucid dreams. But this scale is more likely an enumeration of sorts of non-lucidity. It just what I needed… I can even say, it is not full yet. If I spoke English, I could even give my own classification… Well, I’ll try, and I hope that the first to read it will be a mod and he will be just in time to delete this stuff before any one tries to download it…
I will only speak about non-lucid dreams, because I am just more familiar with them… So, my first category is Classic normal dream, where you feel and behave as if everything were real. I divide it into some subcategories, because they have different ways of transforming into lucid, if they ever have any:
=> Realistic dream. The main hero is you in familiar environment. There can be something strange in the situation and in your own behavior, but you pay no attention to this thing and to the fact that objects, for example, change their form or disappear.
=> Fantastic dream. You realize you can do something impossible in real life, usually fly, sometimes it is breathing under water or making objects move. You find a materialistic or magical explanation to this fact or seek no explanations and just have fun.
=> Parallel dream. I don’t want to say it really takes place in a parallel reality. It is just a dream where you are not quite you and their world is not quite your world. In such dream you can be, for example, a famous scientist, or a spaceport worker on Mars, or a refugee in some kind of post-apocalyptic world.
Next type of dream is Dual dream. I call it this way because it combines two or more views of the dream reality.
=> Movie dream. You observe a story and think it is a movie (though you never see the screen ). Sometimes it is a “sequel” or “remake” of an existing film, sometimes an original story. You are the audience, the director and the hero in turn. People seem to have lots of control in such dreams. You can decide, what turn the plot will take next, and repeat the scenes you liked. You can watch your hero in the moments of fun or fight and take his place in the moments of fear of pleasure. Zero awareness, nevertheless.
=> Book dream. The same stuff, but including written or pronounced text, or, maybe, comics. Can have several views, too, for example, you are a writer, whose books are immediately transformed into a cartoon, where you are one of the heroes.
=> Computer game dream. It preserves the duality of computer game, where you are Duke Nukem and Vasya Pupkin at one at the same time. You may remember that your enemies can kill your alter ego, but not yourself. Or you may try to remember what key you must press to use the weapon you are holding in your hands.
Here the kingdom of tacit and semi-lucid dreams begins. I’d like to mention separately such categories:
=> Voluntary awakening. You realize you are dreaming, but use this fact only to wake yourself. It can be endogenous, exogenous and pseudo-exogenous. Endogenous awakening must be rather usual for nightmares. I don’t know anything about it, because I never have nightmares… Exogenous forced awakening must be quite rare, but I think it can happen sometimes that you hear something coming from real life and wake up to see what it is or just because you understand it’s time to get up. But I only had pseudo-exogenous awakenings, when I think I hear somebody trying to wake me up, though they are only a part of the dream.
=> Programmed dream. You intend to do something in a dream, and you do it, but don’t realize the fact of dreaming itself. There can be several types of such dreams. Fearless dreams must be usual for people practicing other methods of dream control than lucid dreaming, senoi system for example (sorry probable misspelling). You remember that nothing can harm you, but don’t think why and don’t understand other things. For example, you don’t understand fully that you cannot really harm anyone while you are here and that you can think out any fantastic way to defeat your enemies. The other type is Dream with programmed action. For example, you remember you must look at your hands in your dream. If you don’t recognize it as a dream next moment, you will just continue your dream, and it will be not lucid, but programmed.
=> Dream related dream. I would divide them into three subcategories: Dream about dreams, Dream about lucid dreams, and Dream about becoming lucid. I’m not sure it is clear, but I’ll try to explain… You can have a classic or dual dream, where the hero has a non-lucid dream or just dreams are mentioned. You can have a dream, where not just dreams, but lucid dreams are discussed. The third category is a dream where you kind of realize you are dreaming, but it is not real lucidity, but only a part of the plot. It can be transformed into real awareness, but can be stay a lonely spark of lucidity in the middle of the story.
Then there must be several types of dreams, which can be called lucid, but not quite suit definitions. For example, dreams with full awareness but lack of control, vividness or stability… Or the thing whispa wrote about… But, I don’t know about you, but my spell-checker seems to be tired , so enough by now. Bye!